Hello and welcome to the Nutrition Devo podcast I'm your host Monica Reinagle

and today I have a roundup of answers to questions sent in by listeners over the past several months.

If you've sent me a question, you might hear your answer today.

And if you have a question for a future episode, you can email it to me at nutrition at quick and

dirty tips.com you can also leave me a message at 443 9616206.

So our first question today is from Gwyn, who wrote,

I have been vegetarian for about three years.

I eat a lot of plant-based meats,

and I wonder if they are actually healthy or not.

I want to eat less processed foods and I'm thinking

that plant-based meats could be just a really fancy processed food.

Well, Gwen is absolutely correct that it does take an

awful lot of processing to turn a soybean or a wheat kernel into something that

resembles ground beef or Italian sausage.

Even so, the impact on the environment is still lower than raising animals for food

and obviously no animals are harmed in the process.

For a lot of people eating a more processed food is a price that they are willing to pay in exchange for not consuming animal products.

Now of course you don't have to eat fake meat at all, but a lot of people find

these products useful in transitioning to a diet that includes less or no meat.

If reducing your consumption of processed foods is also a priority,

you could start by cutting down on highly processed snacks, desserts, and beverages.

Because unlike plant-based meats, these usually aren't adding much

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